Statement released by the group taking credit for today's attack in Tunisia

The Uqba bin Nafi Battalion has taken responsibility for today's attack in Tunisia. The attack, which was launched before dawn, left four members of the Tunisian national guard dead. The attack was targeting a Tunisian military checkpoint in the Chaambi region near the Algerian border.

According to Al Jazeera, 20 fighters from Uqba attacked the checkpoint killing the four soldiers. The fighters then stole the soldiers' weapons before fleeing. Al Jazeera quoted the Tunisian Prime Minister as saying that this was a "cowardly terrorist attack." The Prime Minister goes on to say that, "we will chase the terrorists, the assassins, into their hideouts in order to exterminate them and clean up the country."Uqba has been behind several attacks in Tunisia in the recent past. In July 2014, the group was responsible for an attack in the Chaambi Mountains that left 14 Tunisian soldiers dead and 20 others wounded. Additionally, on Dec. 18, the group published photos showing its spoils of war gained from attacks on the Tunisian military. In that same document, they also claimed two attacks on the Tunisian military. You can read my reporting of this over at The Long War Journal, by clicking here.Uqba is a joint project between al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and Ansar al Sharia Tunisia (AST). The group was originally formed to recruit Tunisians for AQIM and then giving them rudimentary training before sending them to more advanced AQIM training camps in Algeria, Libya, or Mali. While some have said that Uqba has defected to the Islamic State, this does not appear to be the case. Last month I took a look at Uqba and its connections to other groups. My friend and colleague Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, confirmed to me that even from the beginnings of the group, "it was extraordinarily clear where its allegiance lies." He continued by telling me that being a joint project between AQIM and AST, it should be clear that its allegiance is to AQIM. You can read more about Uqba and its connections by clicking here.- Caleb

In its most recent video, Ansaru, an offshoot of the vicious Boko Haram, differentiates itself from its parent organization. The video, which is nearly 20 minutes long and has English subtitles, includes accusations against the Nigerian military made by the group. "The ammunition and bombs of the Nigerian Army," Ansaru says, "has for long been responsible for loss of a lot of Muslim live (sic)."

The video then goes on to detail the Nigerian military killing civilians near Maidiguri, as well as the burning of houses in other places of northeastern Nigeria. For instance, the video dedicates several minutes to Mundu village, which the group says was burnt down by the Nigerian military. Ansaru interviews several citizens who corroborates their claims. At the end of the segment, an unidentified speaker says "We (Ansaru) must fight them", referring to the military. The video then cuts to Ansaru fighters compensating these same villagers for their losses. After this, the video then paints Ansaru as the defenders of the Muslims in northeastern Nigeria. While the unidentified speaker talks about "Jihad in the cause of Allah", the video shows several Ansaru fighters training somewhere in Nigeria. The speaker then says, "To protect the lives and properties of the Muslims, away from the actions of Jamaatu Ahl al Sunna Lidda'wati wal Jihad, popularly known as Boko Haram." The speaker then charges Boko Haram with deliberately targeting Muslims in mosques and markets. The video ends with the group sending their condolences "to the family of those Muslims killed around the world, especially in Black Africa."

By charging Boko Haram with deliberately killing Muslims, which Ansaru sees as going against the word of God, Ansaru is separating themselves from its parent group. Throughout the video, Ansaru tries to paint themselves as the protectors of the Muslims in Nigeria. The real targets, as Ansaru states, is the Nigerian military.

This is not the first time Ansaru has tried to distance itself from Boko Haram in recent weeks. In a video released in late January, the group also did the same. In that video, an Ansaru figure states "Our aim is different from Jamaatu Ahl al Sunna Lidda'wati wal Jihad (popularly known as Boko Haram) that attack mosques, markets, motor parks and other public places." The video continues by saying, "We (Ansaru) do not kill any Muslim, nor attack the Muslims in the places of their day to day affairs. We only wage jihad to help the weak Muslims who are being oppressed." Screenshots of this video can be seen below, courtesy of Gilles N. on Twitter:

In its designation as a terrorist organization, the US State Department noted Ansaru as being "focused on Nigerian military and Western targets." State notes that while Ansaru has launched numerous attacks on Nigerian military and government targets, Ansaru has "also conducted several kidnappings of foreigners living or working in Nigeria." Ansaru has also conducted military operations to support al Qaeda groups operating in Mali. In January 2013, Ansaru targeted a convoy of Nigerian troops in Kogi state. These troops were preparing to deploy to Mali.

While some analysts have suggested that recent events showcase that Boko Haram is close to the Islamic State and Ansaru loyal to al Qaeda, neither claim has been confirmed. However, both groups have ties to al Qaeda. The Guardian has found that several Boko Haram leaders were in contact with top leaders of al Qaeda. This revelation was due to documents found in Osama bin Laden's compound in Pakistan. Additionally, the State Department has noted that Boko Haram has ties to al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM). The Long War Journal has also documented that Boko Haram leaders were included in a series of communications of al Qaeda leaders back in the summer of 2013.

According to the Combatting Terrorism Center (CTC), a Nigerian named Khalid al Barnawi, an influential leader in Ansaru, is a former kidnapping accomplice of Mokhtar Belmokhtar, an Algerian al-Qaeda leader. Another leader within the Ansaru and Boko Haram networks, Mamman Nur, not only has ties to AQIM, but also al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, al Qaeda Central Command and even the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan. The CTC also documents ties between Boko Haram/Ansaru and al Shabaab, al Qaeda's official branch in Somalia.

Additionally, Ansaru's condemnation of Boko Haram's killing of civilians is reminiscent of various al Qaeda leaders condemning the targeting of civilians. For instance, after the Pakistani Taliban attack on a school in Peshawar in Dec, Usama Mahmood, the spokesman of al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent condemned the attack. Like Ansaru, al Qaeda painted the killing of Muslims as "un-Islamic"; furthermore, both groups also identified military establishments as justifiable targets for attack. Other al Qaeda leaders and affiliated groups also spoke out against the attack (interestingly enough, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan didn't). As my colleague Thomas Joscelyn points out, "Al Qaeda and its branches have indiscriminately killed women and children in the Muslim-majority world in the past. But al Qaeda's leaders, including Ayman al Zawahiri, learned that this was a liability for the group." It appears that Ansaru has adopted a similar approach to managing its propaganda strategy.In the case for Boko Haram and the Islamic State, no direct ties have been documented. However, recent releases by the group, which includes a new social media presence, suggests the group has at least been inspired by the Islamic State's media productions. At most, Islamic State media personnel have helped Boko Haram revamp its media campaign. While some have suggested that Boko Haram has pledged bayah (allegiance) to the Islamic State, this has not been confirmed. - Caleb

A roundtable, held last week at the Institute of African Studies reports that the Nigerian government's "...campaigns have not addressed their plans for combating the growing insecurity that has left Nigerians living in fear, and paralyzed educational and economic activities in large swaths of Northeastern Nigeria." A string of terrorist attacks have occurred as Nigeria has struggled to build a functional and coherent response. Fortunately, there is a science-based approach to create societal coherence that can protect Nigeria from both internal and external threats. It is called Invincible Defense Technology (IDT) because it assures invincibility, peace, and even economic progress, to the nation and the military that employ it.

IDT is totally unlike any other defense technology because it does not use violence in an attempt to quell violence. It is a more civilized approach, one especially worthy of nations that abhor violence as a means to power. IDT uniquely goes to the root cause of violence - the built-up stress in the individual and collective consciousness. Scientists have evidence that high levels of collective societal stress are the underlying cause of war, violence, crime and terrorism. When the IDT methodology is applied, stress levels throughout the population are rapidly reduced.

In an environment of lowered stress even staunch adversaries find ways to cooperate and overcome long-standing differences.

IDT Reduces Societal Stress

IDT uniquely neutralizes the underlying power base of contending groups, which is the stress, frustration and civil dissatisfaction prevailing in the general population. By eliminating the root cause of insurgency, violent outbreaks are pre-empted and prevented. IDT is effective because it gets to the heart of the matter. Terrorism often thrives in nations in which decades or even centuries of under-employment, poverty, and hunger have created a huge societal weight of stress, frustration and endemic unhappiness. This inevitably finds expression in acts of terrorism, civil unrest, social violence, and a downward spiral of economic degradation.

A specially trained military unit, an "IDT Prevention Wing of the Military," uses IDT to reduce stress in the national collective consciousness. IDT could also be introduced into other large groups such as the police forces, or militias. As the stress and frustration ease, the population is more capable of finding orderly and constructive solutions to their problems.

Experience with IDT in other war-torn nations demonstrated increases in economic incentive and growth. Entrepreneurship and individual creativity also increased. With increased civic calm, people's aspirations are raised and a more productive and balanced society emerges. Such a society abhors violence as a means for change or as an expression of discontent. With this, the ground for terrorism is eliminated. What is more fascinating, this change takes place within a few days or weeks after IDT is introduced. The changes are measurable from such statistics as crime rates, accidents, hospital admissions, infant mortality, etc.

Military personnel in Latin America, Africa and Asia practice group Transcendental Meditation to help protect their nations

Rapid Transformation Through IDT The daily routine for the IDT military personnel includes the nonreligious practice of the Transcendental Meditation® program along with its advanced form, the TM-Sidhi program. As a societal coherence-creating military unit, they practice these programs twice a day, seven days a week, preferably in a secure location near the targeted population.

Such coherence-creating groups have achieved positive benefits in society, shown statistically, in a short time. Modern statistical methods used in this research show a low probability of any explanation other than a causal influence of the technology. The IDT approach has been used during wartime resulting in the reduction of fighting, a decreased number of deaths and casualties, and an improvement in progress toward resolving the conflict peacefully. The war in Lebanon in 1983 was dramatically impacted in a peaceful way by an IDT Intervention Group. A thoroughly documented study of this phenomenon was published in the Journal of Conflict Resolution, and summaries of follow-up studies were published in the Journal of Social Behavior and Personality and the Journal of Scientific Exploration.

Summary

IDT works by utilizing our natural human brain mechanics, the most powerful natural resource possessed by every nation on earth. The beneficial transformational effects of IDT have been statistically proven numerous times to decrease and prevent violence and terrorism, and boost the economy.

The military that deploys this powerful, human-resource-based technology disallows negative trends and prevents enemies from arising, and as a result, it has no enemies. No enemies means no war, terrorism and no insurgency.

The Time for Action is Now

IDT is the twenty-first century's leading-edge defense system. If Nigeria establishes IDT Prevention Wings of the Military, they will ease high tensions, reverse mistrust, crush hatred, create stability and permanently prevent war and terrorism. Extensive scientific research objectively says, "Yes, the system works." Why not use it in Nigeria? Time is running out. The best time to act is now, before Nigeria's perilous situation worsens.

Dr. David Leffler was a member of the US Air Force for nearly nine years. Dr. Leffler served as an Associate of the Proteus Management Group at the Center for Strategic Leadership, US Army War College. He now serves as the Executive Director at the Center for Advanced Military Science (CAMS) in Fairfield, Iowa and teaches IDT. Contact at: http://www.davidleffler.com